Development of a New Game-Analysis Method for Badminton

- With the Aim of Applying it to Doubles Games -

Abstract

Up to now, as the game-analysis method for badminton, a game-analysis method for singles games has been developed and utilized as a fairly effective one. Namely, strategic interpretation has become possible by reading opponents' stroke movements through a chain of their relations given as spatial information. For doubles games, on the other hand, owing to the complexity of combinations which four players bring about, an analysis method good for practical use cannot necessarily be said to exist at present. For this reason, we have developed a new analysis method which can be applied effectively to the analysis of doubles games as well as singles games.
In order for the new analysis method to have further generality, the developed analysis-method has the following four view points newly added to the analysis method by Abe et al. which has been utilized so far. The view points are, 1) whether the approach-traveling phase is passive one or active one, 2) the purpose of the stroke movement, 3) how the state of opponents' stroke was made to shift, and 4) what was the effectiveness of the stroke. Next, the effectiveness of the new game-analysis method was examined by analyzing and assessing the effectiveness of strokes exerted at the rear court by the Malaysian pair who won the championship at YONEX Open Japan 2002 in men's doubles.
As a result of the analysis using the new method, it has become partially apparent how precisely the Malaysian pair were attacking in relation to the opponents. A possibility was found how the new analysis method described in this research would become a useful method by adding further improvements in the future.